A never-ending book and the pen of divorce

I am on page 1000! With normal books, written by non-crazy people who weren’t Samuel Richardson, this might signal getting somewhere, but nope, I’m only two-thirds of the way through. Basically, to summarise those last 1000 pages, Clarissa didn’t want to marry one ugly bloke, ends up saved/slightly kidnapped by a hot one, he turns out to be a bit evil and rapey, and she’s in a mess.

The book is in the form of many letters, and I found myself thinking how long it must have taken Clarissa and Lovelace to write the letters out, using pen and ink pot. Probably just a feather back then. And then I remember it’s actually just a book, and it was Samuel Richardson who spent years it must have been writing out not far off the million words of Clarissa, constantly dipping his quill. And a much as I begrudge him for writing such a long tome, my initial thought that the characters had written the book shows he did something right.

I was recently given the gorgeous pen you see on the book, as I can finally get divorced. I have waited seven years for this, as there would be a huge difference in costs and courtroom argy-bargy, if I waited until my daughter was 16. This pen was a gift from Sarah and two other friends, so I can sign my name on those forms with style. Boo-ya. I know they say the pen is mightier than the sword, but if this divorce encounters any problems, I’m sure they’ll send me one of them in the post, too, so I’ll have options.